The present invention relates to arrangements in a protection container in order to enable feed-out of an electrical cable stored within the protection container, said cable, at one end thereof, having a plug/socket and, at the other end thereof, is supplied with electrical power, and wherein feed-in/withdrawal of the electrical cable into the protection container again is allowed after use.
Such a cable having a contact means of the plug or socket type at the free end thereof and, preferably, coupled to a power supply at the other end, can be used in connection with an electrical apparatus, machine or other device/means carrying a complementary contact means, e.g. a socket or a plug, respectively, the two mutually complementary contact means being plugable, one within the other. Said electrical apparatus, etc., may e.g. be constituted by engine heaters in motor vehicles, battery charging apparatus for electrical vehicles and the like. The cable may possibly be provided with signal conductors which, through remote control, may start/stop e.g. a motor heater or other apparatus.
Norwegian patent application No. 961492 discloses a feed-out device for a plug adapted to be plugged into a socket and positioned at the end of an electrical cable assigned a power supply. This automatically functioning feed-out device is not assigned a protection container as the one according to the present invention for the protective envelopment of cable with plug/socket, but serves exclusively to secure a controlled feed-out of the electrical cable's plug when it is pulled out from the socket in which it is plugged, the socket being incorporated into said electrical apparatus, etc., e.g. the engine heater; in case one has forgotten to haul the electrical cable's plug out from the socket of the engine heater.
When using engine heaters in motor vehicles, the electrical cable together with its plug, after the latter has been released upon being pulled out from the socket of the engine heater, often becomes lying unprotectedly on the ground, subjected to being overrun and damaged. In such an unprotected position, dirt and other impurities will easily find their way into the plug, and cable and plug can freeze firmly to the ground during periods of frost in the winter time. The plug at the end of the live electrical cable, in an unprotected position, lying on the ground, represents a risk factor for children. Upon contact with metal parts of the plug, a child may get an electrical shock.
Norwegian patent specification No. 165 088 discloses an apparatus adapted to cause an automatic hauling of the electrical cable's plug up to a higher positioned level in a garage or the like. This prior art apparatus is very comprehensive. As mentioned, it is based on an operation including a hauling of the plug of the cable up to a position in which it is not available to a child, i.e. a position in which the plug does not represent a risk factor, but the apparatus does not comprise a protection container for protective envelopment of cable and plug/socket in an inoperative position of readiness. For the installation thereof, this known hauling apparatus requires a column of a not insignificantly height.